OSA Fellows

The Optical Society recognizes distinguished achievement in the field of optics and photonics through the presentation of awards and honors. OSA members who have served with distinction in the advancement of optics and photonics may be proposed for election to the class of Fellow. The Business Leadership category provides a clearer path to recognize distinction in the business community. Fellow nominees are assessed in the context of their achievements and career path.

OSA Fellows from Industry & Elected for Business Leadership

Year of Induction 2018:

George Bayz, Synopsys, Inc, USA, For impactful leadership to the OSA and the optics industry, both through his exemplary volunteer service as Treasurer and ongoing leadership of a leading optical design tools company, ORA/Synopsys.

Donald Golini, SANICA Ventures, USA, For outstanding contributions to the optics industry through development of deterministic finishing systems based on Magneto-Rheological Finishing (MRF) and sub-aperture stitching interferometry platforms for large, fast and aspheric surfaces.

Joseph Gortych, Opticus IP Law PLLC, USA, For excellence in advancing OSA members’ understanding of patenting and intellectual property, especially through two decades of publications in Optics & Photonics News.

Anatoly Grudinin, Kaithree Photonics, UK, For highly successful and dynamic entrepreneurship in forming and developing the company Fianium, a leading supplier of ultrafast fibre lasers and supercontinuum sources, and outstanding contributions to fibre laser research.

Nicusor Iftimia, Physical Sciences Inc., USA, For original contributions in biomedical optics, especially pioneering the use of optical coherence tomography for interstitial tissue imaging and biopsy guidance, as well as for outstanding service to the biomedical optics community.

Mike Mandina, Optimax Systems Inc, USA, For business leadership within the greater Rochester optics community, the U.S. and global optics industry, and technical leadership in the development of an innovative high speed polishing technique called VIBE.

Alan B. Petersen, Spectra-Physics, MKS Instruments, Inc., USA, For significant and innovative contributions to the design of commercial scientific and industrial UV laser systems and for long term service to the optics community.

Paul Westbrook, OFS Laboratories, USA, For outstanding innovation, technical and program leadership in photonic devices, particularly development and application of fiber Bragg grating technology for communications and sensing.

Xuezhe Zheng (PhD), Wave2Wave, USA, For significant and sustained contributions to the research and development of optical switches and wdm silicon photonic interconnects.

Year of Induction 2017:

Raymond G. Beausoleil, Hewlett Packard Labs, United States, For seminal contributions to basic and applied research in photonics and optics with applications to information technology

Walter F. Buell, The Aerospace Corporation, United States, For technical leadership in the development, application and exploitation of advanced laser radar technology and in building a broad based community of researchers, developers and users of active EO systems

Peter de Groot, Zygo Corporation, United States, For influential and groundbreaking work in the field of high-precision optical metrology

John J. Degnan, Sigma Space Corp, United States, For leadership in the advancement of laser technology and its applications in satellite and precision interplanetary distance ranging, 3D imaging and atmospheric lidar, free space optical communication and medical instrumentation

Po Dong, Nokia Bell Labs, United States, For seminal contributions to the advances in silicon photonics devices and integrated circuits for high capacity WDM networks

Jeff Hecht, Hecht Associates, United States, For informing and educating professionals as well as the general public in the advances in optics and lasers

Richard B Holmes, Boeing Company, United States, For contributions in the area of atmospheric and adaptive optics, imaging and remote sensing, and laser beam propagation through the atmosphere

Hong Liu, Google, United States, For significant contribution and leadership in datacenter optics and networking

Rüdiger Paschotta, RP Photonics Consulting GmbH, Germany, For the creation of an online encyclopedia on optics and photonics and for important contributions to the understanding and optimization of ultrafast lasers

David E. Spence, Spectra-Physics, United States, For invention and demonstration of the self-modelocked Ti:sapphire laser and for significant and innovative contributions to the design of commercial scientific and industrial laser systems

Kathleen Tse, AT&T Corp, United States, For technical excellence and sustained leadership in the development of flexible, seamless optical network architectures and for exemplary service to the optics community through leadership of the Optical Fiber Communication Conference

Year of Induction: 2016

Nobuyuki Hashimoto, Citizen Holdings Co., LTS, Japan, For development of liquid crystal optical devices for use in a wide variety of instruments, Blu-Ray disks and applications in precision measurement and microscopy

David Stork, Rambus Inc, U.S.A., For pioneering contributions to the theory and practice of computational imaging, computer vision and pattern recognition, including their application to the study of art.

Wenbing Yun, Sigray, Inc., U.S.A., For his numerous innovations and his outstanding leadership in the development of X-ray microscopy, and its commercial development

Year of Induction: 2015

Gisele Bennett, Georgia Tech Research Institute, U.S.A., For technical innovation in the use of optical imaging and for research leadership.

Robert P. Breault, Breault Research Organization Inc., U.S.A., For pioneering leadership in the formation of global optics industry clusters.

Frank J. Effenberger, Huawei Technologies, U.S.A., For outstanding and sustained contributions to the research and development of broadband optical access networks, particularly passive optical networks, and the standardization of optical access technologies.

Jason Matthew Eichenholz, Open Photonics, U.S.A., For achievements and leadership across a broad spectrum of projects in supporting open innovation, entrepreneurship, commercialization, technology and strategic developments for multiple corporations, and for excellence in leadership at OSA.

Year of Induction: 2014

John H. Belk, Boeing Research & Technology, U.S.A., For outstanding technical and program leadership in optics and photonics for industrial R&D including innovative applications of interferometry, spectroscopy, ellipsometry and nano-calorimetry.

Ornan (Ori) Gerstel, Cisco, Israel, For seminal contributions to high-capacity optical networking that have enhanced efficiency, reconfigurability and flexibility of different types of architectures.

Bo Gu, BOS Photonics, U.S.A., For outstanding and sustained contributions in development of lasers, laser systems and applications, in particular laser micro- and nano-machining in industrial fabrication and high-power fiber laser applications in industrial metal processing.

Kafai Lai, IBM, U.S.A., For seminal and influential contributions to extend optical lithography and pioneering work on source mask optimization in the semiconductor industry.

Katherine L. Hall, WiTricity Corporation, U.S.A, For contributions to the understanding of ultrafast semiconductor devices, development of advanced fiber communication systems and entrepreneurship in optics.

Christoph Harder, Harder & Partner GmbH, Switzerland, For his pioneering contributions to the development and commercialization of high-power 980-nm pump lasers for telecom optical amplifiers.

Fred L. Heismann, JDSU Optical Networks Research Lab, U.S.A., For seminal and sustained contributions to the understanding and control of polarization effects in optical fiber systems through the realization and use of integrated-optical devices.

Sukesh Roy, Spectral Energies LLC, U.S.A, For pioneering development and application of advanced optical combustion diagnostics, especially those based on ultrafast lasers, and for tireless continuing service to OSA.

Peter G. Schunemann, BAE Systems, U.S.A., For seminal contributions to the development and optimization of nonlinear optical materials for mid- infrared frequency conversion devices and applications.

Douglas P. Holcomb, LGS Innovations, U.S.A., For continuing breakthroughs in the design and optimization of deployable high power optical sources for challenging environments.

Mary Lou Jepsen, Pixel Qi Corp., Taiwan, For visionary entrepreneurial and technical leadership of the One Laptop Per Child program to develop a rugged, low-cost educational computer for developing countries.

Wilhelm G. Kaenders, TOPTICA Photonics AG, Germany, For founding and running successfully an optical company developing scientific and industrial grade diode and fiber-based laser systems as well as actively serving the optics community and in particular the OSA.

Fredrik Laurell, Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan (KTH), Sweden, For pioneering contributions to the development of periodically poled materials and important contributions to laser physics and nonlinear optics.

Lenore McMackin, Inview Technology Corp., U.S.A., For significant contributions in basic and applied research in holographic, tomographic and imaging systems and for outstanding contributions to OSA.

Isao Noda, Procter & Gamble Company, U.S.A., For developing two-dimensional infrared correlation spectroscopy, a method that has been expanded to other probing methods and utilized for studying the structurespectrum correlation for a wide range of materials.

Stanley E. Whitcomb, LIGO, U.S.A., For seminal contributions to the development of large-scale interferometric gravitational-wave detectors, in particular in his role leading the development and successful commissioning of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory interferometers.

Year of Induction: 2011

Sterling Backus, KMLabs, U.S.A., For the development of a new generation of ultrafast lasers with unprecedented few-cycle-pulse duration and high average and peak power which have transformed ultrafast optical science.

Krishna Bala, Oclaro, Inc., U.S.A., For significant contributions to optical-mesh networking and for co-founding a company which successfully built the first high-capacity optical-switching product that was a key enabler of today’s optical networks.

Alex Cable, Thorlabs Inc., U.S.A., For early seminal contributions in laser cooling and trapping and for founding and nurturing innovative optics businesses that are internationally recognized leaders.

R. Edward English Jr., L-3 Communications, Cincinnati Electronics, U.S.A.,For important contributions in diffraction theory, for seminal contributions in the optical design of high-energy laser systems, and for dedicated management/leadership at the National Ignition Facility Project of LLNL.

Shibin Jiang, AdValue Photonics, Inc., U.S.A., For significant contributions to optical glasses and fibers, especially for development of new multicomponent glass fibers and fiber lasers.

Ashok V. Krishnamoorthy, Oracle Labs, U.S.A., For pioneering contributions to the research, development, and commercialization of optics in computing systems.

Xiang Liu, Bell Laboratories, Alcatel-Lucent, U.S.A., For contributions to fundamental research in optical fiber communications that have been incorporated in commercial systems, including high-speed phase-shift keyed transmission and nonlinearity mitigation.

Frédéric Merkt, ETH Zürich, Switzerland, For ground-breaking work on the ultrahigh-resolution spectroscopy of Rydberg states of atoms and molecules and for the refinement of high-resolution photoelectron spectroscopy and its application to the determination of the structural and dynamical properties of molecular cations.

Kenneth E. Moore, Zemax Development Corp., U.S.A., For the development of state-of-the-art optical design and analysis software combining the capabilities required by the expert designer and the ease of use and accessibility needed for an occasional optics analysis user.

Latest News

Each year, nearly 800,000 people in the U.S. experience a stroke, and almost 90 percent of those are ischemic strokes in which a clot cuts off blood flow to part of the brain. To prevent further injury, blood flow to the brain must be restored as quickly as possible. In a new study, researchers show that non-invasive optical sensors can provide clinicians with real-time feedback on whether clot busting treatments are restoring blood flow. The technique, which monitors blood flow and oxygen levels in the brain, could also reveal early warnings signs of neurological complications after a stroke.

Student Membership Pricing

OSA supports the next generation of researchers and engineers. Students pay just $20 USD for 1-year membership; $10 USD for students residing in an economically developing nation. Save even more with a 3-year term.

The Optical Society's (OSA) mission is to promote the generation, application and archiving of knowledge in optics and photonics and to disseminate this knowledge worldwide. The purposes of the Society are scientific, technical and educational. OSA’s commitment to excellence and long-term learning is the driving force behind all its initiatives.